WHITELEY is a visual journey into the private life and creative legacy of Australia’s most iconic artist, Brett Whiteley, told “in his own words” using personal letters, notebooks and photographs, interwoven with reconstructions, animations, archival interviews and rare footage.

A mentally-ill addict, in the grip of schizophrenia and crystal methamphetamine (ice) addiction, convinced the drug is helping him.

Long-term ice user Aaron’s delusions are so great, one minute he thinks the drug helps him sleep, the next he thinks it keeps him awake — all the better to guard him against the people he’s convinced are out to get him as he descends into full-blown paranoia.

The schizophrenia is exacerbated by his ice use, but Aaron believes it heals him.

His disturbing plight unfolds in the first episode of confronting new ABC documentary series Ice Wars.

Just days before filmmaker Alex Hodgkinson and her team started filming Ice Wars, an in-depth exploration of Australia’s growing crystal methamphetamine issue, they learnt firsthand how easy it was for the drug trade to flourish almost unnoticed under people’s noses.

ONE of Australia’s top drug enforcement officers Detective Superintendent Tony Cooke, Commander of the New South Wales Drug Squad, has revealed the extent of Australia’s spiralling problem with addiction.

Just a week before filming proper began on Ice Wars, a townhouse opposite the crew's production headquarters in Redfern was raided. Inside the building was a meth lab, categorised as medium-sized, just shy of an industrial-scale outfit.

Cognisant of the rapid changes in the broadcast environment these days, Northern Pictures head of factual Karina Holden believes one should never rest on one’s laurels. Rather than just use the phrase as an empty sentiment to describe an upcoming production slate, she practises what she preaches as evident by her own 2013 jump from a comfortable job as a commissioning editor at the ABC.

Karina Holden is the head of factual entertainment at Northern Pictures.

Her list of credits include Go Back To Where You Came From for SBS, and Changing Minds for the ABC.

Her new show is Luke Warm Sex, a six-part series which follows comedian Luke McGregor as he tries to get better at sex with help from sexperts, therapists, scientists, tantric practitioners and sexual empowerment coaches.